"Folding" for profit, not fun - Bitcoin

[MadduckUK]

ah right, didn't go with them because of the potential for that so dunno if it actually applies. I cant see how it wouldn't though.

[EzyRyder]

How long do you guys think it will take to make up £300 with 2 5850s? At current rates I mean and deducting leccy.

[MadduckUK]

about 20 days if everything stayed the same as it is now - im presuming thats 300Mhash per card, if you OC'd em enough to get to 350, which has been done then about 17 days

[EzyRyder]

Mmm thanks a lot for taking the time to answer, that assumes some overclocking to the cards which I am not keen on at least past CCC limits…

I am going to buy the following as a Bitcoin earner…

I3 540 with stock cooler
Gigabyte GA-H55M-UD2H
2 GB DDR3 RAM PC1333 Mhz
160 GB SATA HDD
2 x XFX AMD 5830s
620W Antec PSU

It comes up at just above £300. I have to account for leccy which I will imagine it will be around 40-50 quid a month but I think I can pay back its cost if I have it on 24/7 for a month in just one month and then just profit the rest! How much do you think the leccy will be?

[MadduckUK]

if you can find 5850's at anything close to the 5830's price go for them - they draw a good bit less power and fold a good bit faster, let us know how much you pay per KW/H and i or someone will rustle up some estimate.

[Domestic_Ginger]

Forget CPU power and get the cheapest SLI/Xfire board with a C2D or 939/AM2 chip. 1GB ram should probably be okay.

I switched off two cores as they aren't needed. You should be able to get a Linux install on a USB.

[EzyRyder]

I can get brand new 5830 for £80 ... though...

5850 for £115 and 5870 for £150....

[EzyRyder]

Forget CPU power and get the cheapest SLI/Xfire board with a C2D or 939/AM2 chip. 1GB ram should probably be okay.

I switched off two cores as they aren't needed. You should be able to get a Linux install on a USB.

cheapest crossfire board I can find is the one below for £35 inc.

[1stRaven]

if the 5850 matches the 6870, then you will be hitting around 265-270mh/s per card.

[Domestic_Ginger]

340 Mhash/S (900/450)

[MadduckUK]

300Mhash/S (820/900).

anything less than 300 out of a 5850 is a travesty, they should all do at least that with no touching of the voltages at all

[EzyRyder]

How much internet data does this need a day? I am thinking on getting a USB 3G dongle and run them at work. I have got space for 2 additional computers.

I assume that 1GB per month should be enough, or isn’t it?

[MadduckUK]

quick test with TBBMeter, and some maths shows it will use about 100MB / month / GPU

that was only a 5 min test and i have been conservative with the numbers - but i dont see why it would vary too much

[EzyRyder]

Thanks mate, really appreciated.

[Rob_B]

~355/360Mhash/s

5850 @ ~967 Core

[badass]

I'm fascinated by what's happening to Bitcoins now- I wonder how high they'll rise before the bubble pops- and I'm 99% sure it will pop, and fairly soon. This is a classic speculative mania, which will proceed faster than most bubbles because of the sheer ease of trading BTC and the speed at which the news is spreading round the internet. I'm pretty sure that right now, non-geeks who have no idea about how Bitcoins work- and wouldn't care if they did- will be thinking that they'll be missing the boat if they don't buy some. the New Scientist article may well be followed by mainstream media exposure. The price rises we have seen in the last couple of weeks are quite ridiculous, but it could well be that we ain't seen nothing yet.

But then at some point the bubble will pop- it could pop very quickly in fact, at which point Bitcoins will go back to being worth a few pence each, if anything. I'm convinced the things have absolutely no inherent value, and that this is human fallacy at its finest. If so, it'll be quite the purest speculative mania of all time, since the things being speculated upon were quite literally magicked out of the ether by the guy who invented them. Swapping a house or a bag of gold coins for a tulip bulb was complete lunacy, but at least you could plant it and grow a tulip at the end of the day.

I also compare this to the tulip mania. However remember one phrase "the market can remain irrational longer than you remain solvent"
It's actually a warning about short selling but makes a good point about bubbles being unpredictable and often last far longer than any sane logic could suggest.
This is a proper bubble as well - look around the internet about bitcoin and it's got all of the right elements. The bull**** ometer is going off the scale right now, the over analysis, the buzzwords and the utter, utterly convinced people that bitcoins are going to hit $10,000 or more each.
I am currently arguable in an at risk position. I bought a graphics card early for this - £130 worth of 6870. I was going to wait for the 7000 series but I thought the improvement plus cash was worth it. So far, the £45 I have in cash has gone straight into the account that pays bills. Electricity is paid up until the 15th June withn that. The other £65 on its way has paid for half the GFX card.
A 6870 for £55 is a bit of a bargain IMHO. If they collapse now, I'm fine with that. For now, I'll collect payment for coins to pay for the electricity. Once this 6870's paid off, I'll get a Sapphire Vapor-X 6870 so I can use all of my SATA ports again
The XFX one will go into my Media PC and keep crunching. I'll probably not bother getting any more cards until the 7000 series is released TBH.